 Matrix Rules Debate, What's your take on the matrix rules? |
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 Jun 22 2007, 03:42 PM
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#51
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Technomancer  Group: Retired Admins Posts: 4,638 Joined: 2-October 02 From: Champaign, IL Member No.: 3,374  |
How so? |
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Jun 22 2007, 03:43 PM
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#52
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Neophyte Runner Group: Members Posts: 2,078 Joined: 26-February 02 Member No.: 67 |
My question is this: is there anywhere one can go to find a well-organized list of these Matrix rules concerns?
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Jun 22 2007, 03:45 PM
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#53
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Hoppelhäschen 5000 Group: Members Posts: 5,807 Joined: 3-January 04 Member No.: 5,951 |
Because with the packet apporach, this turns 'infinite potential connections, only System x 2 active (which I understand to be communicating) connections at once' into 'near-infinite active connections through multiplexing'. |
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Jun 22 2007, 03:45 PM
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#54
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Running Target Group: Members Posts: 1,498 Joined: 4-August 05 From: ADL Member No.: 7,534 |
Yes, in the matrix FAQ I have a version with my own answeres here: http://forums.dumpshock.com/index.php?showtopic=15863 |
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Jun 22 2007, 03:45 PM
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#55
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Hoppelhäschen 5000 Group: Members Posts: 5,807 Joined: 3-January 04 Member No.: 5,951 |
Because, you know... metaphors are not real. :P |
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Jun 22 2007, 03:46 PM
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#56
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Snakehandler Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 7,454 Joined: 28-April 06 From: London, England Member No.: 8,508 |
This argument sounds nice, but to me it is like a waiter in a restaurant bringing you a tray of ingredients and explaining - "Hey, we didn't want to lock you into any one culinary choice, so we thought we'd just let you create something on your own." To which you reply, "Um, I can do that at home." You say the gray areas "allow" the GM to improvise, to make wild, creative, free-ranging choices. Well, all GMs can and should do that ANYWAY. That is a basic premise of RPGs - that the GM can do things the way he wants, fill in what the rules inevitably miss, add stuff to keep players on their toes, and on and on. That is "allowed" from page one. We shell out money for a rules system because we are looking for a shortcut, a WORKING framework for the creativity. We need this for two reasons: (1) In a table-top RPG, everyone imagines things a different way. Everyone has a different idea of "how things work." A defined set of "rules" allows everyone to be on the same page with regard to what they can and cannot get away with. Like rule of law and property rights in a free economy, they give an incredibly complex system predictability, upon which people can then add their creativity in constructive, mutually recognizable ways. (2) Most gamers do not have time to make this set of "rules" for themselves. Many may like to, but they have to go to work and make money or whatever. So like all successful civilizations, there is a division of labor in which we all pay a little of that money to a few of the best designers to do that work for us - and hopefully they really are the best designers. Now, I appreciate that the new system can be sort of run like the way Ultraviolet systems were supposed to go - don't be so rigid and treat things like an allegory of the meat world. But (A) it's NOT the meat world or an ultraviolet host, and (B) we could already do that anyway if we were so inclined; we don't need anyone's permission. As they stand now, the matrix rules do NOT meet EITHER of the above-mentioned criteria (1) or (2). They do not provide a point (1) shortcut to a common point of reference for players and GMs, since besides being near-unintelligible, they are self-contradictory. No one will know what they are capable of as a hacker or TM without first having some LONG conversations with each individual GM. And the necessity of having those LONG conversations essentially invalidates point (2) in that instead of PLAYING, the GM is now spending an inordinate amount of time figuring out and ruling on how things work - something he paid good money not to have to spend his precious free time doing. I have played Shadowrun pretty much religiously since, what, 1993? There have been ups and downs in the writing, both of fluff and rules. But always way more ups than downs, as far as I am concerned. I will absolutely continue to support this product. But someone needs to admit that the current Matrix rules are a total joke - THE worst thing the game has ever put out. If you want proof, all you need to do is look at the sheer volume of rancor and controversy they have engendered. Someone needs to have the guts to admit they dropped the ball on this mess and start again from the ground up with the upcoming books - they need better organization, some playtesting by the kind of players that love to develop ingenious workarounds (as every shadowrunner should), and ANY examples of play would be a nice improvement. |
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Jun 22 2007, 03:49 PM
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#57
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Hoppelhäschen 5000 Group: Members Posts: 5,807 Joined: 3-January 04 Member No.: 5,951 |
Nowhere near complete, but given enough pain... Perhaps it would be a good idea to start a sticky. |
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Jun 22 2007, 03:51 PM
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#58
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Running Target Group: Members Posts: 1,498 Joined: 4-August 05 From: ADL Member No.: 7,534 |
Adamu, very good points! Exactly what ive been thinking.
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Jun 22 2007, 04:15 PM
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#59
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Neophyte Runner Group: Members Posts: 2,078 Joined: 26-February 02 Member No.: 67 |
That's never a good judge of proof, first of all. Because lumping all the feedback in together doesn't mean that all the feedback is addressing the same concerns. For an example, there are people who complain that the Matrix rules don't reflect reality enough. Fair enough, but there were conscious and required concessions made in that regard in order to streamline Matrix play for gameplay reasons. You're never going to make everyone happy. And frankly, when you design a game (whether it's pen/paper or a video game), making everyone happy isn't a design goal. Now if the feedback is about valid concerns that impede the design goals that were intended, that's worth keeping track to see if it can be corrected.
A complete rework from the ground up in a sourcebook is just not going to happen. Sorry. But the reason I asked my above question about a clear list of the concerns is that with a list in hand, the writers and developers can go through and see what we can address in the future sourcebooks. |
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Jun 22 2007, 04:21 PM
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#60
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Hoppelhäschen 5000 Group: Members Posts: 5,807 Joined: 3-January 04 Member No.: 5,951 |
It isn't even necessary. There are some procedural kinks in the rules that can be corrected by changing a few sentences, which is well within the scope of an Errata. |
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Jun 22 2007, 04:23 PM
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#61
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Technomancer Group: Retired Admins Posts: 4,638 Joined: 2-October 02 From: Champaign, IL Member No.: 3,374 |
Sure they are. There a real, valid representation of an unfamiliar concept in a familiar way. That concrete representation is the metaphor. I see no reason why this somehow implies omniscience with respect to Agents with a dog-brain Pilot. Hell, I studied education at university, and it's a well known technique in Behaviorist theory to take the unfamiliar and make it familiar. If it's unfamiliar for a person to use multiplication (we're talking third graders here) then you teach them multiplication with the familiar arithmetic concept of repetative addition. In this case, the metaphor that you're using the represent the unfamiliar multiplication is the more familiar addition operations. Once day, the person because adept with multiplication and moves beyond this metaphor. Within each metaphor there are rules which are defined by that metaphor's setting. All characters who act within the metaphor are subject to those rules. And, I don't see any reason why what is real within one metaphor has to be real within another one. |
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Jun 22 2007, 04:30 PM
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#62
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Technomancer Group: Retired Admins Posts: 4,638 Joined: 2-October 02 From: Champaign, IL Member No.: 3,374 |
I'm not saying that at all. I'm saying that the developers made the wise decision to take things as a far as they thought they could to provide a set of basic, applicable rules to the majority of situations that a gamer would encounter. After that, they simply said your mileage may vary and leave it up to the GMs.
I've found that they do. As I indicated above and in other threads, I've no problem with the current rules, nor have my probably between 15 and 25 different players over the two years since SR4 was released. Is this a statistically significant portion of the population playing SR4 as a whole, probably not, but it's significant to me. I continue to maintain that nothing is contradictory in the matrix rules and that they are intelligible. I've had hacker characters from people who have very little knowledge of computers and they've been able to read, digest, query, and respond to these rules and create successful characters. |
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Jun 22 2007, 04:31 PM
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#63
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Hoppelhäschen 5000 Group: Members Posts: 5,807 Joined: 3-January 04 Member No.: 5,951 |
Because the Agent is neither unfamiliar twith the concept, nor is the metaphor the concept - it expresses it. The Metaphor exists for human users only and expresses the processes of program running on that machine. An Agent is a program running on a machine, and thus, it's creator has neither need nor incentive to make it use the metaphor - it can use the direct interfaces the metaphor is build upon.
That's a really bad example. Mostly because that's how digital calculations are done. |
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Jun 22 2007, 04:34 PM
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#64
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Hoppelhäschen 5000 Group: Members Posts: 5,807 Joined: 3-January 04 Member No.: 5,951 |
Don't worry, such blissfull ignorance fades quickly after the first programming attempts and the hours spent at debugging. :P |
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Jun 22 2007, 04:40 PM
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#65
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Technomancer Group: Retired Admins Posts: 4,638 Joined: 2-October 02 From: Champaign, IL Member No.: 3,374 |
I wasn't going to go this deep into my views on sub. lists, but I will now, I guess, since the short version wasn't clear. I see the infinite subscription list as a list of devices that can request priority access to another device. We'll stick with the Sammie's PAN for now. All 'ware, gear, etc. that the Sammie has is in the subscription list for their commlink and, thus, any item within that list can request priority access to the commlink. Note, I'm not implying the priority access is somehow a technical term for the game of Shadowrun. I use the word "priority" here to indicate that a device is indicating to the commlink that they would like to be added to the active devices in the subscription list which are limited to System x 2. Now, I feel that any player can set a number of devices (up to System x 2) as having priority access by default. For example, the Sammie might want her smartgun to have a dedicated, active subscription at all times. Thus, it has active access to the commlink regardless of whether or not it's trying to send packets back and forth at that time. Plus, perhaps the Sammie is also a medic and subscribes the biomonitors of her three teammates at all times. Now she has 4 devices actively subscribed and she can actively subscript up to System x 2 - 4 more devices before she has to start playing around. Yes, the cyberware like limbs or fingertip compartments or whatever that don't require this dedicated access can remain the subscription list but inactive. And, if there was at least 1 active slot left in the active list, then I'd allow any number of devices to potentially use that channel and then pass it along to another device that needs it without worrying about devilish details like transfer times, bandwidth, etc. because that's not a level of reality that I wish to represent in my games. I will admit, most people in my games have had a System of at least 3 on their commlinks regardless of their archetypes. As a result, I've not had a major probably with subscription lists because people have generally only subscribed 2 or 3 devices by default to their commlink. The rest of the devices just send messages to it as necessary. This is also, incidentally, what facilitates the communication of teammate with teammate. |
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Jun 22 2007, 04:44 PM
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#66
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Technomancer Group: Retired Admins Posts: 4,638 Joined: 2-October 02 From: Champaign, IL Member No.: 3,374 |
But the agent is instructed by a person and the person requires the metaphor. Thus if the person is constrained by the metaphor, I see no reason to assume that the instructions (still constrained by the metaphor) can somehow free the Agent of the constraints of the metaphor. The Agent doesn't see the metaphor, but there's no way for the person not to be involved therein as it instructs the Agent. When I program an application, I have to work within a specific language (or set of languages if I'm including compiled libraries, I suppose) and that language presents me with a metaphor, if you will, which constrains the way in which I communicate with my program (my Agent) through that language (the metaphor). If the metaphor somehow forbids an action then I cannot instruct my program to do that. |
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Jun 22 2007, 04:46 PM
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#67
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Hoppelhäschen 5000 Group: Members Posts: 5,807 Joined: 3-January 04 Member No.: 5,951 |
It was perfectly clear. Unfortunately, my version obviously wasn't. Take your approach. Make those connections activate only for, say, a nano-second at a time - which, given near-infinite bandwidth is enough to transfer quite a lot. Let everything cycle trough, based on priority. Now you got a standard networking approach that, even with a limit of one connection at the same time can process near-infinite connections near-simultanously. The limits to that are: bandwidth, processing speed, memory and human stupidity. (After SR and Einstein, three of those are de facto infinite.) |
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Jun 22 2007, 04:47 PM
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#68
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Hoppelhäschen 5000 Group: Members Posts: 5,807 Joined: 3-January 04 Member No.: 5,951 |
That's what the test when giving orders is for. Then, the Agent acts unrestricted by the metaphor... just, sometimes, the metaphorical orders are so obscure that they are not intelligible to the Agent. |
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Jun 22 2007, 05:09 PM
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#69
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Target Group: Members Posts: 68 Joined: 26-January 06 Member No.: 8,201 |
If you take someting that works well in a game system, thats designed to offload some of the overhead, and to make the game run smooth, and then apply it to the real world and seak to abuse it in every way shape and form, yeah it breaks. Congrats.
Do they? Sure. Are they still working within the metaphor at all times? Yes they are. Regardless of how you spin things the Agents actions will allways coincide with the metaphor of the topology of the node. So the metaphor for your stealth program, a wall, will block the agents 'sight' directly to you. But he, the agent, may 'see your shadow poking out', or maybe 'hear something' behind the wall and raise a alert. All of those actions are essentialy getting a success on the die roll but all play out in the realm of the metaphor. You can not just seperate the metaphor from things. Its always there as long as a persona is there to percieve it. Actions with a persona present are always done in context of the metaphor. Allways. The metaphor is as real as the actions behind it. |
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Jun 22 2007, 05:12 PM
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#70
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Technomancer Group: Retired Admins Posts: 4,638 Joined: 2-October 02 From: Champaign, IL Member No.: 3,374 |
That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying that the character can dedicate an active channel to a device for as much time as they choose to do so. In other words, they can define top priority to a number of devices equal to System x 2. The other devices not given that priority do, as you say, compete in a round robin. This has forced players in my games to make sure that they have at least one subscription list index open at all times so that nigh-instant communication can take place between devices as necessary. Yes, I agree that with a System of 3+ it becomes almost pointless to worry about subscription lists except for (a) the very meticulous player and (b) dedicated hacker/rigger type characters with Agents and Drones.
I disagree. The whole concept of the matrix in Shadowrun breaks down if you assume that Agents are somehow omniscient. They're not. They're pilot programs with limited understanding and limited potential. They are limited in their understanding and potential based on the metaphor within which they're acting. In fact, it is the metaphor which gives rise, I feel, to these limitations. You and others see the metaphor as window dressing so that the matrix isn't simply gambling (rolling dice) and, instead, has some attractive bits that you can use to try and spice up a matrix with respect to roleplaying, or at least that's what I think I'm understanding from you. That's the understanding I disagree with. Metaphors are, for me, a specific virtual reality in which Agents and Hackers are constrained by the rules of the Metaphor. This is a basic interpretation of the nature of the game and I'm not willing to, nor do I see a need to, be flexible on this matter because the alternative that have been shown to me all seems to lead directly to an unintelligible mass of rules that don't make sense. What's the incentive for me to change and, for that matter, what's the incentive for you not to? Yes, I'm being egocentric here, I don't mean to offend. This post has been edited by Dashifen: Jul 19 2007, 02:03 PM |
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Jun 22 2007, 05:15 PM
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#71
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Mr. Johnson Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 3,148 Joined: 27-February 06 From: UCAS Member No.: 8,314 |
I'm sorry, but your argument is wrong. I never said that nobody else can have a problem with the rules just because I don't. My group uses the rules as written and does not have a problem with it; that's a fact. Yours does not; that's a fact, too. The two are not mutually exclusive, so there's no disagreement. It's like saying that the sign posts in my town are green and in yours they're yellow. We don't have to "agree to disagree" about that. |
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Jun 22 2007, 05:18 PM
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#72
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panda! Group: Members Posts: 10,331 Joined: 8-March 02 From: north of central europe Member No.: 2,242 |
wow did i stir a hornets nest.
my take on the connection thingy. local devices: (smartlink, cyberware, that personal storage chip in your underpants), pan. as long as they are part of the pan they act as if they are part of the comlink node. no connection needed. office node: does not support a persona and rarely does outgoing connections, ergo, infinite connections. just look at my original post where i point out that the subscriptions list is persona related not node related. for everything else you need a subscription. but as that limits it to the nodes your persona is accessing at the moment, the drones and agents that your operating as a leashed dog, and maybe the connections to the rest of the team. if you need more then 12 connections to maintain that i wonder what your up to... |
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Jun 22 2007, 05:20 PM
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#73
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panda! Group: Members Posts: 10,331 Joined: 8-March 02 From: north of central europe Member No.: 2,242 |
as for the unhackable comlink running a army of ever vigilant IC, sounds like its cant be used for much else ;)
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Jun 22 2007, 05:32 PM
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#74
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Hoppelhäschen 5000 Group: Members Posts: 5,807 Joined: 3-January 04 Member No.: 5,951 |
Actually, a sota computer system that allows 12 connections max is already broken by design.
Actually, that's perfectly possible and the basis of any sculpted system like online bars and the like - metaphor without any meaning, the equivalent of illusions. You even can exchange metaphors, that's what a reality filter does. |
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Jun 22 2007, 05:35 PM
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#75
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Genuine Artificial Intelligence Group: Members Posts: 4,019 Joined: 12-June 03 Member No.: 4,715 |
Why is the connections rule there in the first place? As far as I can tell, the only real purpose is to limit the number of drones you can simultaneously control. Does it serve any other purpose? At all?
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